Poetography & Literary Reviews

Poetography

“Poetography is an art form that merges poetry and photography,” Allard, who currently lives and works in New Brunswick, Canada, explains. “I enjoy working in both words and images. As a poet, I like to tell stories in a succinct fashion, using an economy of words. As a photographer, I try to find the image that creates an emotional resonance with the poem. Combining the two media gives me a greater range of expression than I would have with photography or poetry alone.” Allard prefers the simplicity of nature in her photography.

"This
slim volume is a fitting ode to the geography and the cultures of two
far shores sharing the same ocean. The poems are accessible and
unpretentious, but never simple. They capture the rhythms of local
speech, the images, the history, in way that only those who've lived
long along these shores can. Written in English, with fine French
translations, as well as Shetland Islands dialect,it's an engaging read
presented by two poets - Donna Allard and Nat Hall - who know their
regions well." Lee Thompson Executive Director Writers Federation of New Brunswick

~~~

ARTS EAST REVIEW

October 26th 2013

Two prolific poets/poètes
share a fascination for language; an attention to minute detail lyrically
explored to become worlds of their own; a geographical and spiritual connection
to the Atlantic Ocean and its offshoot waterways…Donna Allard and Nat Hall
combine their works, inspired and penned from their Shediac Bay (New Brunswick)
and Shetland Island (Scotland’s northern archipelago) homes, to create a
collaboration: From Shore to Shoormal (D’un rivage à l’autre).

Each poet embraces her own expressive style and observations,
and yet their mutual bond is genuinely apparent throughout the entire tome. It
is as if you can picture Allard and Hall standing each on her own shore or
shoormal communicating to the other with timeless messages dug up from
somewhere deep inside. Appropriately Hall writes in “Atlantic Home”:

Oh, wow, I found a bottle in the sea.

Water-washed words,

it spoke of shores,

my horizon can imagine…

From Shore to Shoormal transcends expected
descriptions of natural landscapes to yield a cornucopia of themes: navigation
and battles, heartache, memories and love, pollution and extreme weather, history,
culture and livelihood. For instance, a whole story is told in Allard’s “Northwest
Passage”. An excerpt reads:

eerie

like a Steven King novel, all roads leading to the wharf,

clogged with fog, dreamlike…

footsteps

cigarette lit, deep sigh, a distant horn heard…

ball cap removed, reshaped

The fact the poems are presented in both English and French
is a real treat; some are even written in the Shetland dialect, and others
incorporate expressions of Hall’s home. Even without being fully versed in each
language, it is intriguing to explore the changes in rhythm and sound, even
slight meanings, when comparing the translations. It is equally satisfying to
read each version aloud feeling your tongue move in novel ways to produce
melodious or elegiac tones.

Hall writes that words hide in stones. Both poets
have successfully quarried verse and visions for many a reader—perhaps while
sitting on their own shoreline—to enjoy and ponder. ~ Michelle Brunet

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Welcome

Honorary member of the Canada Cuba Literary Alliance (CCLA), Proud member of the Canadian Women in the Literary Arts (CWILA), Writers' Federation of New Brunswick (WFNB), Road Scribes of America (TM), and Royal City Literary Arts Society.
Donna Allard presently lives at her beach house year round with her cat 'Gale'. She became inspired by Canada's Peoples' poet Milton Acorn, and editor Libby Oughton. Her mentor was poet activist Valerie LaPointe.